Slave of our behaviour (2015)

Despite the intention and effort to break unwanted habits, many people fail in changing these behaviours. In this study the researchers have investigated the effect of implementation and goal intentions and intrinsic habit tendency, the dominant use of the habitual control system, on changing unwanted habits. Using a within-subject design, participants (N=19) kept a sport and snacking diary for five weeks. Based on their diary entries during the first week, participants were coached to form two types of intentions: an implementation intention and a goal intention. One was formulated with regard to increasing healthy snacking and the other with regard to increasing sport behaviour. Intention types were counterbalanced across participants. Participants carried out the intended behaviour for four weeks while continuing the snack and sport diary. Intrinsic habit tendency was measured with the Slips of Action Task (de Wit et al., 2012). The findings suggest that the effectiveness of implementation intentions might be moderated by habit tendency and other potentially important factors, like daily life structure.